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Queens 'under new management' (archive thread)

Well I've only been there 4 or 5 times in my life - wrong end of town, but I'm really saddened by its loss. - Don't know of any other pub with quite the same selection of late night randoms.

:(

But anyone know if the premises were owned or rented? If it was fully owned, then I guess the current owner was made an offer they couldn't refuse.
 
If i see sean i am sure he will ask me for it. i might get away with it though. i dont feel guilty i must have spent 7 grand there over the past 7 years.
 
"So what can we do??? I am increasinlgy thinking it would be a good idea to produce some sort of concise newsletter about all these developments that people are so pissed off about and distribute it in the areas where these things are happening. "

Or a poster on the door of the Queen and on lamposts outside Dog And Living and BCycles, explaining what's going on and what the implications are, with a suggested action or a date to meet in an appropriate place to protest. It seems more people have shared the Merritt insult for too long than any other Brixton issue - all the stories I've heard about people's attempts at having parties and setting up alternative venues and fresh informal scenes squashed by them over the years . . . there seems no doubt about their evil monopolistic nature and so many people have been affected. There could be a turn-out of hundreds for this if managed the right way. Problem is, a planning meeting is not the MOST inspiring event to attend . . . Isn't there some creative way we could turn these fucking places on their heads and have some fun?
 
I don't know whether the planners/licensing people are aware, but there really is an increasing number of angry, alienated people in Brixton regarding pub takeovers.

With the Hob management having left and it's future unclear that'll be another cheap place for brixton characters and locals taken away from them.

Everyone goes on about diversity and vibrant community in Brixton.

But if you take away the cheaper pubs and the places where alternative scenes develop, there won't be any new "vibrancy and diversity".

:(
 
Originally posted by hatboy
Everyone goes on about diversity and vibrant community in Brixton.

But if you take away the cheaper pubs and the places where alternative scenes develop, there won't be any new "vibrancy and diversity".:(
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I think this is important. I've always seen the Merrettisation of Brixton as being a key initial stage of gentrification.

On it's own it doesn't seem to signify much: it's only a bar, after all; a tacky place for scootsticks to say "Wickid!" and "Sortid!" before disappearing back to their wealthier area of London having bought some fake drugs on Coldharbour Lane.

But Merrett provides what a sociologist might call an 'alternate cultural infrastructure' for Brixton. He infests the culturally important night-life of the neighbourhood and transforms it (in the corner he controls) into the image of the gentrifying economic and social group which he favours i.e. which he believes will most effectively line his pocket. The local businessman who called recently for the return of SUS is coming from a similar direction.

They want to change Brixton into a district in which they can make more money. They spin this (basically venal and self-serving) desire into wanting 'progress' and 'change for the better.' Naturally those who oppose their plans are slandered as small-c conservatives.

It's where money and culture meet in Brixton and something nasty is happening. I noticed with the recent business-led Brixton Expo (which was great in some ways) that Brixton's rich political history was largely ignored, in favour of market stalls selling ethnic knick-knacks. A creative and cultural Brixton: code for a South London ethnic Disney World?
"So what can we do??? I am increasinlgy thinking it would be a good idea to produce some sort of concise newsletter about all these developments that people are so pissed off about and distribute it in the areas where these things are happening. "
Click to expand...
This is a good idea. Gentrification battles are going on all over Brixton. From colonising nightclubs to gated security estates for the rich to flogging off social housing to closing the cheap boozers. It all needs to be brought together. So many people are involved in local campaigns and so many people care with a passion. They shouldn't be isolated. Watch this space.
 
Originally posted by hatboy
With the Hob management having left and it's future unclear that'll be another cheap place for brixton characters and locals taken away from them.
:(
Click to expand...

I may have missed other information on Urban about this :confused: but are you able to say anything more about these Hob changes hatboy? Or anyone?
 
The management have left the Hob for sunny Torquay. By the looks of it there will be new management I heard it might be the assistant manger. Things will stay preety much the same I expect as its still owned by the same brewery anyone new might make a few changes to music policy or promotions but thats about all I think
 
Management in the Hob has changed several times over the past 10 years so. Improvements such as there have been have been good ones eg car park transformation into a beer garden. With any luck it will continue to be run along the same lines.
 
Interestingly, there is a theme emerging here viz the Queen and the Hob, as there was a former Irish landlord of the George Canning who left soon after being given a vicious beating in the pub. IIRC (Mike?) it was sold to Wychwood and became the Hob not long after.

Unconnected -- or would developers really sink that low to get their hands on potentially lucrative local boozers? Not insinuating, just asking. :)
 
Well I pass the Queen every couple of days and it looks about a week away from re-opening. Go up and have a look in if your passing, the windows aren't painted over or curtained while they rennovate.

They don't seem to have done very much to it, except perhaps put in new bars, as they look new, but I might be wrong as my forays into the Queen were never with less than a skinfull on board.:oops:

As the work they have done is minor, and could have been completed more quickly, this leads me to believe that they will be attempting to change the crowd that drinks (drank?) in there. It's a well used tactic employed to clear out regulars by shutting down their local for as long as it takes them to get established elsewhere.

I might be wrong so I'll reserve comment until the bar actually opens again, but I bet I'm right.
 
Last ''real'' pub that stays open late? Well, there is the Windmill, and I s'pose the Hobgoblin could loosely be described as ''real" (more so than when it first opened in a blaze of theme pub bric-a-brac hellishness, anyway), but they are a bit of a trek if you really want to go for just one more quick pint and then home because you've got to go to work in the morning.

The Queen was sorely missed at the end of isvicthere's bitrthday evening last week, though his spirited rendition of Pretty Vacant (twice) nearly made up for it. ;) :D
 
Originally posted by IntoStella
Last ''real'' pub that stays open late?
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Thing is that much of the appeal of the Queens was it's 'jazz' approach to licensing laws - not many people I knew drank there during normal drinking hours, preferring equally 'real' pubs like the Albert, Effra etc.

I loved it as a late night venue with a terrific, Bradys-esque atmosphere on some weekends, but it wasn't my choice for a 'regular' night in the pub.

If people had liked the Queens enough to drink there during regular licensing hours, perhaps the pub may not have had to change hands...
 
Originally posted by Justin
The only sense in which the Hobgoblin is real is the sense in which it does not appear to be a hologram.
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Holographic pubs! Now there's a thought. They could wink out of existence the minute a patrol car approached. Mind you, the sight of lots of drunk people standing around on an empty plot, trying to look innocent, might give the game away. Assuming you could get drunk on holographic beer, that is.
 
Originally posted by editor
not many people I knew drank there during normal drinking hours, preferring equally 'real' pubs like the Albert, Effra etc.
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Guilty as charged, M'lud. Unlike Anna Key, I cannot claim to have ever been a salt-of-the-earth, queueing outside at 11 in the morning, ''real'' Queen loyal. ;)

But I'd have thought it likely that the Queen sold more booze after 11pm than many local boozers sell during licensing hours! It was usually pretty lively, especially at weekends, though I think business was tailing off towards the end. Perhaps its regular clientele decamped to Living bar? ;) ;) :D
 
From what I remember, The Queens had a great selection of Country and Irish songs on their jukebox. :)

I'd only been there two or three times but always had a great time there.
 
That must be the most abused song that is sung in a sing-song.

Some idiot who doesn't know the words starts off and sings one verse badly allowing it to fizzle out after the first chorus ... :mad:
 
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